The Disaster That Is How We Elect People

Even before the Supreme Court opened the floodgates, any attempt to reform or otherwise improve the way The World's Last Great Democracy elects its leaders was a massive demonstration of the futility of shoveling sand against the tide. Any reform has to pass muster with some of the very people whose careers were endangered by reform. Then, Chief Justice John Roberts and his merry majority turned what few election laws we had into ashes. Now comes an important report from the Center For Public Integrity that conclusively demonstrates how the Federal Election Commission has been rendered the primary buffoon in an ongoing farce. The report found that the FEC is beset with the customary partisan gridlock, and that it is starved for resources and manpower by a Congress awash in the money that the FEC was set up to regulate. This creates a number of problems, and they are created quite deliberately:

Advertisement - Continue Reading Below

The commission over the past year has reached a paralyzing all-time low in its ability to reach consensus, stalling action on dozens of rulemaking, audit and enforcement matters, some of which are years old. Despite an explosion in political spending hastened by key Supreme Court decisions, the agency's funding has remained flat for five years and staffing levels have fallen to a 15-year low. Analysts charged with scouring disclosure reports to ensure candidates and political committees are complying with laws have a nearly quarter-million-page backlog. Commissioners themselves are grappling with nearly 270 unresolved enforcement cases. Staff morale has plummeted as key employees have fled and others question whether their work remains relevant. Among top FEC jobs currently unfilled or filled on an "acting" basis: general counsel, associate general counsel for policy, associate general counsel for litigation, chief financial officer and accounting director. The staff director doubles as IT director.

None of this is an accident. There simply is no real desire for serious election reform in the Congress, and the Citizens United decision rendered any momentum for it moot anyway. A quarter-million page backlog? That's not because a lot of people are out with the flu. And the report also cites a kind of institutional cowardice that has set in among the people actually trying to make the FEC work.

"The commission just seems to look inward and almost wonder aloud if a decision has an ideological impact, and if so, they shy away from it," said Frank P. Reiche, a Republican who served as an FEC commissioner from 1979 to 1985. "It's sad-very sad-and the agency is almost doomed to failure for carrying out its statutory mission unless reform measures are implemented and adopted by Congress."

Advertisement - Continue Reading Below

How can it possibly be that any regulatory decision by the FEC won't have an "ideological impact" of one kind or another? As much as it saddens the No Labels crowd, every political decision involves, you know, politics. This is especially true of political decision that affect political campaigns. And we are told now that the FEC can't do its job unless the Congress -- which is completely populated by politicians who have been elected -- decide to make the job of being elected a little more difficult. "Orr was crazy and could be grounded. All he had to do was ask; and as soon as he did, he would no longer be crazy..."

We are about to round into what is going to be the most manifestly expensive -- and, therefore, the most manifestly corrupt -- midterm election in our history. We are doing so with the untrammelled power of money still the most important issue in our politics. We are doing so with the Voting Rights Act eviscerated and minority voters, most of them poor, having their franchise restricted by their state legislatures. We are doing so with campaign money virtually unregulated, and with the Supreme Court likely warming up to remove the adverb from in front of "unregulated." And the institution charged with controlling this mess on behalf of the rest of us might as well be a two-man law firm in west Texas. Is there anything else that anyone would need to create a plutocracy?

A Part of Hearst Digital Media
Esquire participates in various affiliate marketing programs, which means we may get paid commissions on editorially chosen products purchased through our links to retailer sites.